Abstract

This edition, with translation and notes, by an outstanding historian of medieval optics, should serve to make Roger Bacon better understood and appreciated by those interested in the history of Western thought. Some time ago Bacon was lauded as a precursor of modern science, as an inventor, an innovator in the use of experimental and mathematical methods, a man ahead of his time whose genius went unnoticed by his contemporaries. Then a reaction set in, and the claim was made that his results were all anticipated by others, especially by Robert Grosseteste, and that he had really contributed little to the advance of scientific knowledge. Lindberg sets the record straight in his careful and documented study of these seminal writings. As he notes in summary: "[T]his work did not foreshadow the science of subsequent ages...; rather, it represents an intelligent and creative response to a variety of ancient traditions. Bacon did not possess a seventeenth-century or twentieth-century mind, but a very good thirteenth-century one; and there is no possibility of understanding his achievement unless we view it in medieval context".